Sport Marketing-Management, B.A.

Casey Borish ’15 and the Business of Making Smiles

A sports marketing major while a student at Holy Family University, Borish is currently the director of group sales and community events for the Trenton Thunder, a former member of Major League Baseball’s Double-A Eastern League and now a collegiate MLB Draft League squad. In her role, Borish is part of a small but mighty Thunder team (15 full-time staff members) tasked with creating the fan experience and thus, the smiles.  Think dollar dogs, great giveaways, post-game fireworks and theme nights, lots of theme nights, designed to put connect the community with the franchise and, oh yah, to stage a 40-game baseball season.

“The cool part about minor league baseball, and with the Thunder specifically, is that baseball is oftentimes secondary,” Borish said.  “The entertainment, the culture, and the value that we provide, beyond baseball, for families is at the core of what we do. Our owner’s mantra is ‘We make smiles.’ That is what we are in the market to do, and that is what we do really well.”

The position, Borish says, also suits her well in so many ways.

Growing up within walking distance from the HFU Northeast Philadelphia campus, and having attended both Nazareth Academy grade school and high school, Borish first considered a career in education and enrolled at Saint Joseph’s University. While her time on Hawk Hill was enjoyable, she soon discovered that her passions were better suited to sports and returned to her Northeast roots to pivot to a small sports marketing program (she was one of six students in the program at the time) and to play collegiate tennis at Holy Family.  The move fit her like a (baseball) glove.

“Knowing Holy Family so well, I knew it was the right move for me at the time. It turned out to be fantastic,” she said. “ It was a really small program, but I found my groove and my passion by switching into that major. When I transferred to Holy Family, my high school coach knew the current coach, and I ended up playing.  I forgot how much I loved it. It was a huge part of me. When I played, we had girls from all over. I had a teammate from Ecuador.  They recruited from all over the United States to play. We had a really good team. I knew that sports were something that I knew really well and was something I could put my passion into.”

Tackling classes like sports business, sports law and event management, Borish found an opening on the Phillies’ game-day staff through a classmate and was hired on as a 50/50 raffle ticket seller under the community relations umbrella. 

“I knew by the time I graduated that I wanted to focus on sports community relations,” she said. “I wanted to marry that idea of sports and also helping the community and being out there.  I started looking for community-relations specific kinds of spots.”

Knowing that those community-relations slots were coveted, highly sought-after roles, Borish answered an ad for a front desk job with the Thunder, hoping to get an at-bat, if you will.  Her resume, however was better suited to an open assistant community relations post, and Borish slid in.  She has been there ever since.

Borish served as the All-Star Game coordinator for the MLB Eastern League All-Star game in 2018, and used a two-year planning process to coordinate the two-day event.  She also helped to host the infamous and spirited “Savannah Bananas” in 2023.

“The all-star game was nuts,  from my perspective,” Borish said. “I planned the whole thing  and missed most of it because I was at the hotel making sure everyone got to the ballpark.  I  don’t think I slept for 72 straight hours. It was the coolest thing I have ever done or have been a part of.  When the Savannah Bananas came in, I worked as a facilitator on a concourse with a beer and hot dog cart for 6,000 people. It was crazy!”

But fun. Like the dog-friendly games that she promotes. And fulfilling, like the hugely successful Addiction Awareness Nights where she works with DEA and a local New Jersey nonprofit, City of Angels, to better help community members facing challenges.

“I learned that sense of community at Holy Family, and I credit my career path to the people I met there,” she said. “From Holy Family to where I am now, I am so grateful for what I learned there and for the connections that I made. I remember that everyone was so close at Holy Family.  It was great to have an athletic tie-in.  I was not only close to members of the tennis team, but I was also so close with other student-athletes. I ran in those circles, so I had that community aspect.  But it wasn’t just the community of student-athletes, but the campus in general.  The classes were small, and you got to know the people in your classes and to learn from them. In my first school choice, I felt like a small fish in a big pond. I was kind of lost. I didn’t know anybody.  It was tough for me to branch out. I am super lucky to have gotten in touch with tennis because it gave me an in.  It was nice to have people to network with and make connections.  That helped me so much.  And I don’t think you get that everywhere because I don’t think every school is as close-knit as Holy Family.”

Borish now oversees the Thunder’s sales team and runs the organization’s summer internship program. And, of course, she is in constant planning with schools, church groups, little league teams and community partners to put fans in the seats and smiles on faces, attracting crowds that often swell to sell out the 6,440-seat stadium.

“Sports jobs can be tough,” Borish said. “You have to be open to anything and be willing to try everything. In the world of minor league baseball, especially, we wear a million different hats. I have a specific title, but everybody does everything.  We’re pulling tarp.  We’re rolling hot dogs.  You just have to be willing to get in there and get your hands dirty and show that you want to be there and that you are passionate about what you do.  I think that shines through when you have that passion and feel strongly about what you are doing.”

Ah yes, that shining smile.  It all comes back to smiles.